Company Registration in Tenerife

Company registration in Tenerife is a serious process that may take a lot of your time, money and your personal efforts. Therefore, a professional advice and assistance in new company registration process in Tenerife should be sought first of all. Moreover, for your own convenience we can start the process without you physical appearance in Tenerife – you can give us legalized power of attorney  and a copy of your passport. New company registration process will take up to 1 month.

Tenerife is one the most popular and the largest Canary Islands that belongs to Spain. The island is attractive for travelling, doing business or doing both. If you are looking for some business opportunities, you should know that these are the following types of business forms:

• Limited liability company (Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada or S.L.);
• Joint-stock company (Sociedad Anonima or S.A.);
• Permanent representative office;
• Sole Trader / Sole Proprietor (Empresario Individual or Autónomo).

LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY / JOINT-STOCK COMPANY

Usually, limited liability and joint-stock companies are the most popular for doing business in Tenerife. For both business forms the founder of the company can be one person and the shareholder (or shareholders) are not personally liable for company’s obligations. The minimum share capital must be over 3’000 Euro and at the moment of the company registration it must be fully paid. Therefore, you have to open a bank account for that. The biggest difference of the company registration between these two legal forms is that the formalities of the limited liability company are more complicated comparing to the joint-stock company registration. Some of the mandatory steps for the limited liability company registration in Tenerife:

• Obtaining a certificate of company name;
• Obtaining a public deed of incorporation that has to be signed at the Notary office;
• Application for the company tax identification code (CIF);
• Registration of the company;
• Submitting companies’ books to the Central Commercial Registry (Central Mercantile Register) etc.

PERMANENT REPRESENTATIVE OFFICE

If you are already doing business in another country and you want to register the company in Tenerife as the part of your current business, a permanent establishment is the best choice. You have two options for acting as the foreign corporation – to open a branch or an independent company (SL or SA). If having a branch, a parent company will take the responsibility for any liabilities of the branch (like fines from the tax office or employment obligations). Also, as the capital had been already formed by the parent company, the branch does not need to have a backing capital for the start.

SOLE TRADER / SOLE PROPRIETOR

For those who are looking for the minimum financial investment, we can offer another special business form – Sole Trader or Sole Proprietor. This type of business you will be establishing oneself and will be self-employed. Also, you will be responsible for all the company’s debts that incur (unlimited liability). For setting up this type of company you will need:

• To get NIE. Additionally, non-EU citizens have to apply for a combined self-employment work and residence visa.
• Register to pay IAE (Impuesto de Actividades Económicas).
• At the tax office you will need to register a declaration for starting a business.
• To register for social security within 30 days after registering to pay IAE. After this is done, you will have to start paying monthly payment into self-employed persons system (RETA or Régimen Especial de Trabajadores Autónomos). This must be payed even if you do not have income yet.

In addition to the information mentioned above, if choosing any of this business forms, you will also need:

• To open a bank account;
• To have a valid passport (the copy is also ok for the initial steps);
• To get NIE (Numero de Identificacion de Extranjero) – an identification numbers in Tenerife for non-Spanish citizens. Both EU and non-EU citizens get issued a NIE number;
• Other information (i.e. the activity of your business, corporate address etc.)

If you are looking for the opportunities to expand you current business, to enter new markets, to optimize taxes or you would like to start a business from zero in one of the countries in EU, please do not hesitate to contact with us for a successful company registration in Tenerife.